Priya Prakash beats Priyanka Chopra in 2018 Google India search trends

Image: Twitter/@PriyaPVarrier

With 2018 coming to a glorious end, Google India has released an insight into the interests of people. The data revealed by the search engine giant has revealed that Malayalam actor Priya Prakash Varrier has defeated Priyanka Chopra in terms of search trends in India.

Google compiles a list of the things netizens searched for throughout the year. The data points out to spikes in the popularity of search terms in the ongoing year as compared to the previous year. Under this, it divides the search terms into nine major categories – personalities, news, sports events, movies, songs, near me, how to, what is, and overall.

In the ‘personalities’ category, Varrier – who turned into an overnight sensation after a teaser clip of a song from her film Oru Adaar Love released on social media in February this year – topped the list. The popularity of the 19-year-old actor increased the most this year. She was followed by American singer Nick Jonas, who gained popularity in India after the news of his marriage with Priyanka Chopra surfaced. Chopra was listed on the fourth spot.

In the ‘movies’ category, superstar Rajinikanth’s 2.0 topped the list. The movie was in buzz long before its release, but its popularity shot up in 2018 – the year of its release.

WhatsApp’s newly introduced stickers created buzz among the messenger users, who came to Google to search for how to share these stickers with friends on the platform. With this, the search ‘how to send stickers on WhatsApp’ became the top search trend in the ‘How to’ category.

The ‘what is’ search category was dominated by Section 377, which was read down by the Supreme Court in India this year. Section 377 penalised unnatural sex or sexual activities, in-turn indicting people belonging to the LGBTQ community.

In the ‘sports event’ category, FIFA World Cup 2018 climbed up the highest in India. It defeated the popular cricket event IPL 2018 in the search trends list this year. The football event also maintained the top position in ‘overall’ search trend on Google India.

Click here to see the complete list of top search trends in India.